deposit—­used as legal tenders at the Clearing-house, and presented by the banks for redemption, for which there is a special reserve of notes in the Treasury—­and about thirteen millions for the purchase of the twelve millions of bonds already mentioned.  It also sent to the National banks in the West and South three millions of new notes, issued under the act of July, 1870, authorizing an addition of fifty-four millions to the three hundred millions of bank-note circulation previously outstanding, nearly the whole of which has now been issued.

The bank failures West and South, and the pressing requirements to move produce to the ports, led to very urgent demands for currency in Wall street, and certified bank-cheques were quoted at a discount of from two to four per cent. as compared with greenbacks, while fears were entertained that the continued suspension of business would be only productive of harm.  Hence, when the governing committee decided to reopen the Stock Exchange on the morning of Tuesday, the 30th, a feeling of positive relief was experienced.

On Monday, the 29th, only two unimportant country-bank failures were reported, and encouraging accounts were received from the West, although the suspension of a wool-manufacturing company in New York and an iron-manufacturing company in Massachusetts—­each employing some hundreds of men—­and the discharge of more than a thousand men from the locomotive works at Paterson, N.J., showed that the crisis had already affected labor.  On all sides an anxiety to retrench was shown, and large numbers, in the aggregate, were thrown out of employment all over the country.  The retail trade was very unfavorably affected, the losses sustained by the crisis, combined with the scarcity of currency, causing people to expend as little as possible; and this feature, resulting from the crisis, is likely to be a marked one for a considerable time to come.

During the previous week bills on Europe had been, as a rule, unsalable, and rates of exchange were depressed to a very low point, bankers’ sterling at sixty days being quoted on Friday at 103 @ 105, and merchants’ bills at 101 @ 102-1/2.  The difficulty or impossibility of selling exchange greatly embarrassed shippers and retarded the movement of produce from the West; but owing to a heavy reduction by the steamship lines of the rates of freight to induce shipments, strenuous efforts were made to take advantage of it, and the exports from New York for each of the two weeks noticed were valued at about six millions and a half, while for the week ending October 4 the valuation was unusually large—­namely, $8,378,130.  This was the most encouraging feature of the time, especially in view of the previous heavy preponderance of the exports over the imports at New York, the value of the former having increased forty-eight millions during the first nine months of 1873, as compared with the corresponding period in 1872, while the latter were